Payment with one hand once sounded like science fiction but the Amazon One Palm Identification Service has already been used over 8 million timesAccording to the company. This is Amazon, however, which explains why it has been developed in Amazon stores and more than 500 Whole Foods markets in the US, but only 150 third -party sites.
Meanwhile, the newly established businesses such as Latvia Bang They enter the field, with the aim of providing third -party retailers with a similar but independent solution for a faster fund, while taking advantage of the role of giant in spreading biometric payments in the West. (China has already begun to adopt biometric palm payments, with Tencent working Bring Weixin Palm Payment Service to mainstream use.)
Like Apple’s facial ID, Scanning Palm uses more than static images: analyzes the patterns of palm veins and also verifies that the user is naturally present when hovering his hand over the scanner. This method works for safe contact without contact and also applies to wider identity verification scenarios – with players such as Keyo also supporting safe access to buildings and other applications.
On the contrary, Handwave specifically focuses on retail – and since it does not have stores like Amazon, it had to look for partners who needed to have a product. Three years and now with its own material and software, Latvia’s start is preparing for market pilots who will develop palm scanners in retail stores.
Traders who develop starting technology will pay a transaction fee that craft claims will be at the same level as or lower than standard payments. According to hand, faster and cheaper checkouts could reduce costs. But unlike some cost cutting measures, this solution aims to make it easier for customers-with without cards, without applications, no fingerprint scanners and no face scans-even for age and age-verification programs.
Co-founders of Handwave, Managing Director Janis Stirna and Sandis Osmanis-USmanis, have previously worked for one of the world’s largest world payments, Worldline. Despite this relationship, the team aims to build a wide ecosystem. “Our plan is to work with any financial institution or acquiring the bank,” Stirna told TechCrunch.
The start has only worked with a handful of financial institutions so far, “but very big, especially in Europe,” Stinna said. This summer, the start signed an agreement with Visa that could accelerate the development of the Handwave solution in any country, according to its head, Oskars Laksevics.
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While the hand has its eyes on the US market, Laksevics believes it can be an advantage to start in the European Union – “the stricter market in the world” – and show compliance there before it expands.
Being an independent European player could also help start to keep an advantage if or when Amazon decides to offer Amazon more aggressively one to third parties. or if JP Morgan is released His own palm payment experiment further.
The start can be based on other arguments, including pricing. After the financial partners told Handwave that its devices should be able to compete in price, the start has developed its own material and algorithms that make them cheaper than others, Stinna said.
Relying on Riga also allowed the hand to operate with limited capital. The start told TechCrunch that the R&D process was funded through bootstrapping, an Angel investment round of $ 780,000 and $ 267,000 in non -shares funding. This amount comes from EU funded Grant to cyberspaceas well as support from Latvia Inductive business hatchery Liaa and accelerator supported by the EU Ready.
As it is promoted for its first pilots and the acquisition of regulatory certifications, Handwave has now secured a $ 4.2 million seed funding round, led by VCIN Practica Capital, with the participation of Firstpick and Outlast Fund, also from Lithuania. and inovo.vc, a Polish company VC that also operates in the Baltic.
Baltic states have been established as a fintech hub, but they also have scientific talent that is easier for a start -up such as hand to attract and withstand than in Silicon Valley – including AI engineers. “In the Baltic, there are not many companies where you can get this extreme level of technical challenge to resolve,” Stinna said.
As for Laksevics, who had previously had a higher marketing role in Baltic Bank Luminor Bank, where Stiirena had also worked, TechCrunch told her vision. “I left a very well paid corporate job to participate in it and I really think we are building the next big world payment platform,” he said.
Handwave seems ready to put the best hand forward – but only time will say if the market will grab and if biometric palm payments will really be held.
